New York elite dine, but Deep Throat's ID not served

NEW YORK — The 30-year-old legend surrounding Watergate's Deep Throat, with its cloak-and-dagger intrigue and ripe-for-Hollywood characters, has never been far from political theater.

But rarely has that been truer than on Tuesday, at a uniquely New York-style occasion. At a special media event titled "Deep Throat Revealed"--in which Deep Throat was not revealed--Ginger from "Gilligan's Island" lunched beside former South Dakota Sen. George McGovern, and a swanky crowd of more than 100 discussed the nation's gravest constitutional crisis while munching on steak salad and stuffed tomatoes.

FOR THE RECORD - This story contains corrected material, published June 20, 2002.

There are few scenarios likely to land 1972 presidential candidate McGovern beside former-castaway-turned-New York-partygoer Tina Louise. But this is a city that lives by its gossip columns. And public-relations gurus for the new magazine The Week knew there was no better way to score attention around the 30th anniversary of the Watergate break-in than with a carefully chosen lunch crowd of New York media, political and entertainment celebrities.

Described, not revealed

The subject, Deep Throat, was the unidentified government source who aided Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein in their investigation of President Richard Nixon, sparked by the break-in at the Democratic National Committee's offices in the Watergate complex on June 17, 1972. The reporters sketched the source in the book and movie "All the President's Men," as a chain-smoking scotch-drinker, fond of secret late-night meetings in garages. They have vowed not to identify Deep Throat until his death, but the mystery has drawn a stream of theories and guesses.

A featured speaker at Tuesday's event was former Nixon aide John Dean, who has spent 25 years trying to unmask Deep Throat. Dean, the former White House counsel, participated in and later helped expose the Watergate cover-up. He has twice before named Washington figures as Deep Throat--and twice before his theories have been ruled out by the reporters or the suspects themselves.

In the book, Dean admits not knowing Deep Throat's identity, but named four possibilities from the Nixon White House: Pat Buchanan, a speechwriter and, later, a three-time presidential candidate; press secretary Ron Ziegler; and assistants Raymond Price and Steven Bull. All four have denied being the source.

After reviewing all published references to Deep Throat and comparing it to a long list of possible Washington figures--from top FBI official Mark Felt to Washington lawyer Jonathan Rose--Dean admitted Tuesday that he has not reached a conclusion.

"I'm still completing my work, while making sure I've got the right names," Dean told the crowd, packed into a balcony of Michael Jordan's The Steakhouse NYC restaurant.

A few in the crowd were unimpressed with the research.

"Unmitigated gasbaggery," said Lucianne Goldberg, the former literary agent who urged Linda Tripp to record conversations with Monica Lewinsky that contributed to the impeachment of President Bill Clinton.

Most guests, however, simply enjoyed the sport of guessing.

"The question of who is Deep Throat is not the most burning issue before the country, but it certainly is fascinating," said McGovern, the United Nations Ambassador to the Hungry.

Even without an answer, celebrating the mystery sustains the deeper lessons of a critical historical chapter, said author Harold Evans, who moderated Tuesday's discussion.

"Frankly, it's worth making a fuss out of Deep Throat," said Evans, a consulting editor of The Week. "A lot of people today haven't got the slightest clue about Watergate. People say, `Watergate? Wasn't that the movie with Robert Redford?' But Watergate was the greatest constitutional crisis ever. So let's dramatize it."

Crowd possibly star-studded

Depending on the point of view, the lunch crowd was star-studded; well, at least it included Star Jones, co-host of the daytime talk program "The View."

Jeff Greenfield of CNN shared a table with Sydney Biddle Barrows, known as the Mayflower Madam after she was charged in 1984 with running a call-girl operation in Manhattan (this sentence as published has been corrected in this text). Steve Dunleavy, columnist of the New York Post, sat near Jacob Bernstein, son of Carl.

As the crowd reached the crumbs of its cheesecake, McGovern squeezed in a note of seriousness.

"If I could just make one plug for my current passion," he said, taking the microphone, "I want the United Nations, with the United States in the lead, to provide a good nutritious school lunch everyday for every school child in the world. That is something that can be done with modest cost."

Attendees put down their forks and applauded. After closing thank-yous, the group began to disperse. Lillian Ross, who has famously covered a half-century of New York gatherings for The New Yorker magazine, paused on her way out the door.

"McGovern was marvelous," she said, clasping her hands. "Wasn't it like fresh air to hear him talk? And he's right."